To think that pre 9am and post 5pm meetings are just wrong??!

[Youngatheart00]

I’ve noticed this creep recently, working day extended by up to 90 mins / 2 hours especially as I am in a lockdown area so they pretty much know we can’t be doing much else but be available for work (🙄🙄). They are justifying it as no one is commuting so figure it should be acceptable and ‘there is a lot that is urgent and diaries are full’.

Looking at my diary this week I have 3 days with 8am meetings and 2 days with 5pm and 5:30pm meetings (working hours are 9-5). Also seeing meetings scheduled over lunch, they introduced a protected lunch hour at the start of enforced wfh but that seems to have gone out of the window too.

It seems we’ve entered peak zoom over scheduling and with no change of scenery of f2f interaction by 5pm I’m absolutely spent and just need to get out to walk the dog!!!

It’s a salaried role so there is no overtime pay.

I don’t mind the occasional meeting out of hours if urgent but AIBU to think they are unreasonable, not me, and start pushing back?

I've noticed my diary and workload increasing over the past 2-3 months as well.

When lockdown enforced wfh started I was generally able to manage my work well and worked 8-4 so I could walk the dog and still have time to make dinner when I got back. But gradually it's been moving to 4.30 then 5 then later, to the point that I start later most mornings and try to get a run in as I know I won't be finished before 6 regardless of when I log in. No point talking to my boss who routinely sends emails at midnight.

It's horrible and intrusive and gets to the point where I get quite depressed about it - and the darn dog still needs walking regardless of when I finish.

I'm making sure I take some holidays- am off today - and try not to work too long routinely. I'm also at a level where some extra commitment is required, but I've deliberately shyed away from the level above as the personal sacrifice isn't worth the extra money to me.

I bet you’re not the only one feeling like this and that many meetings either aren’t needed, could be done more quickly or don’t need as many people to attend. It’s amazing how it focuses the mind if you have less time. If you could reduce the other meetings then you could hopefully fit in all meetings 9-5? Are you senior enough that you could raise the issue and ask for a review of whether all meetings are necessary - I find myself braver in doing that sort of thing if it’s something that affects others as well as yourself.

This is becoming increasingly common during lock down.
You need to flag this to your manager and HR, plus the health and safety department if you have one, as it is a wellbeing concern. Encroaching on a work/life balance isn't healthy or productive, and the business need to address this.

I block out time outside of my working hours as out of office on my outlook calendar, which usually deters people from booking in meetings - I also do this with my lunch break.
If that doesn't work, I will decline the meeting as others have suggested.

I work with a lot of international colleagues and usually happy to schedule the odd meeting at 8am or 6pm to accommodate those in other time zones, but when it's just UK colleagues, nope. If there is no space in the diary between 9 & 5 until next Thursday, then next Thursday it is. Luckily my boss is of the same opinion.

A boss where I work introduced a new mantra:

'Surely this meeting could be an email'. I think she was sick of careering round the building to various rooms when everything could have been put in a read receipt email.

Really I think you are misinterpreting the early/late meetings as the issue when really it’s the overall problem of your diary is back to back all day every day. Start refusing meetings at any time of the day if you don’t expect to be playing a major role. Always ask the organiser what the agenda is before you accept if it isn’t already in the invite. Ask if you really need an hour or if it can be done in 30 minutes. Block times each day for lunch/walks (they don’t have to be identical times each day if you don’t want it to be obvious you’ve put blockers in) Etc. Sounds like your people pleasing tendencies mean your diary is a nightmare but you need to learn the skills to push back and prioritise non meeting times as it will only get worse the more senior you get.

Sorry, I’m giggling at insurance not being life and death.

I know what you mean though 🤣

Even if you're wfh you're still protected by employment legislation.

Are you in a union? If not I recommend joining one. You could possibly get advice from acas too.

You could maybe even ask for time off in lieu?

You do need to protect yourself though and consider "real life", how long have you worked there? Are redundancies a possibility? Etc

You don't want to (literally) put yourself in the firing line either.

@yelyah22 we need more employers like you. The outdated presenteeism nonsense needs to go and numerous studies show that better supported and appreciated employees are more productive and more loyal (I know "who'd a thunk it"!🙄)

To be honest the frequency of meetings plus the hours creep suggests poor management to me, perhaps even not enough staff?

So many companies have their employees working hard when they could be more productive by working smarter.

and that many meetings either aren’t needed, could be done more quickly or don’t need as many people to attend.

Exactly

I've worked places like that, been at meetings there was zero need for me to be there, a copy of the mins would have been suffice...

Lots of waffle in meetings too!

What are you even doing in all these meetings OP? I agree with @iklboo boss - just send an email and reply with an answer to the query, Ditch the unnecessary meetings and get some bloody work done.

I'd decline them too, and if anyone asks say I have commitments beyond the work day. It's none of their business whether that's walking your dog, caring for a relative or watching Netflix. It's incredibly unreasonable of companies to do this, if they're so busy they need to take on extra staff, not pressure existing employees to work for free. If you attend all of them you're doing more than a day's free work for them. Add that up over a year and see how much cash you're giving them for free!

Are all the meeting essential?

Do you need to start pruning meetings? We have more meetings scheduled these days as everyone is remote and things that would have been covered in 5 minute face to face seem to turn into half hour teams meetings. You need to be ruthless with your calendar and decline things that could be covered by email or you don't need to be in, and make sure you're not having the same meeting 3 times when it could be done once with a larger group etc. Easier said than done though.

Sympathies OP. It's much like this in our company right now - last week our HOD was in meetings most days from 8-6 with only 1 30 min break all day. Not only is it exhausting for him, it means if there's anything we need to contact him about, we can't because his meetings are back to back.

What I notice in our organisation is that the welfare of junior staff is well protected. If you're at the coalface there's lots of wellbeing concern, frequent breaks, clock off at 5, take your hour lunch etc. But the higher you get, the less anyone cares!

Difficult one.

I would say at a certain level of pay and seniority then you can’t reasonably expect your day to always be 9-5.

In my last senior job (which I left due to excessive hours!), my contract stated 9-5 in the office plus any reasonable additional hours to get the job done.

Reasonable is 30 minutes to 2 hours extra per day in my career industry.

But it was a fucking ball ache and one of the reasons I left!

This is happening in our organisition. What used to be a five min phone call is now a 30 min zoom meeting. Luckily our management have identified this as a workplace wellbeing issue and are asking staff to take steps to address zoom fatigue and repetition of meetings between the same people. Can you accept the meetings for now, but ask if it can be raised as a staff wellbeing issue, and start trying to ask for meetings to be phone calls?

No - they weren’t paying you for commuting. Cheeky fuckers.

I work part time and am frequently invited to meetings outside my official working hours. I attend some if it's no big deal, some I decline with a stock of reasons - school run, kids dinner, ferrying to activities etc. I often say "sorry I can't make between 3pm and 5pm, but happy to do 7pm after football if that works for you?" Most people don't take me up on it!

There’s a variety of options to deal

1. Decline the invite and don’t feel guilty!
2. Say you can join for 20 minutes / 45 minutes. People book meetings in multiples of 30 minutes because that’s the outlook default and then they expand to fill that time.
3. If a call is critical at that time, do it from your mobile whilst walking the dog.
4. Block out your diary for lunch / breaks and stick to it.

Some combination of these should help to mitigate, if not completely solve the issue as sometimes you will have to work later however try to do it on your terms not other peoples.

Invent an elderly relative whose breakfast and dinner have to be made for them as they have a broken arm and you’re helping them so strangers with COVID arent in the house...

Even a few days a week as other family members take a turn.. but tell nobody about it being a lie ever!

Can you mess with your WiFi so it doesn't work well out of hours?
I would then explain that because in your local area, everyone else is coming home at 5pm and all the school kids are playing gaming online etc that it's impossible to hold zoom class then?
I personally would make lots of out of work appointments and not be able to attend.
It's not fair - life is really difficult at the moment sand everyone needs their alone time.

I work somewhere where flexibility goes one way only!
Manager announced recently she would keep the 8 to 8.45 free for any of the team that had queries. I suspect her cornflakes have been uninterrupted.

I also really detest "lunch and learn" meetings - at least when they happen in the office lunch is provided. When they're during WFH, the implication is that no one should be taking a screen break during the day. Truly irresponsible employer.
I either ignore them, or take my lunch break afterwards.

Don't decline without an explanation - explain why and make the meeting requester feel unreasonable.

DH (and I), work in a company that spans multiple time zones in both hemispheres. For certain departments and roles, it is distinctly career limiting, not to be available for out of hours calls, and makes it very difficult for departments to do their jobs. Having said that, I've made it very clear, I expect give and take, so if he has to do 2-3 hours of calls outside of hours, then I expect that on another day, when convenient and possible, he'll finish early or take an extremely long lunch. . .

He's had days when he's 'on' from 7am to 11pm, with barely time to pee. . .

I also really detest "lunch and learn" meetings - at least when they happen in the office lunch is provided. When they're during WFH, the implication is that no one should be taking a screen break during the day. Truly irresponsible employer.

Yes, this is also the problem I'm having with remote working - we're having more meetings, but also meetings used to be a built-in break from a screen, now they just make screen time even more elongated and intense. I'm struggling with it at the moment as I recently went down to 4.5 days over four days rather than five standard days, and I hadn't thought properly about the fact that not working Friday means (at my employer, anyway) that I hardly miss any meetings and so that means I spend a bigger proportion of my time in meetings and have lost a lot of my actual 'work' time.

@EveryDayIsADuvetDay oh yes the bloody brown bag learning sessions. Just about acceptable when physically at work as at least a lunch at your screen was different from face to face meetings with people, but at home - insufferable.

The worst was at the start of lockdown when they had lots of mental health sessions, some of which were mandatory and all of which were at lunchtime. My mental health was just peachy provided I got a decent break from the screen and the chance to go for a quick walk or at least hang out some washing.